Hourglasses
by Vera-chan
Summary: Tsuzuki contemplates his partner's ability to put life and meaning into an otherwise endless stretch of time.


**Pairing:** Tsuzuki x Hisoka  
**Genre:** Romance-y  
**Chapters:** One-shot.  
**Spoilers:** None  
**Disclaimer: **Not mine!  
**Comments:** Written for a livejournal Valentine's Day challenge! Mostly just a Tsuzuki-insight sort of thing. I really like the way it came out, though..!

x-x-x

When one lived forever, time was not an issue. A few months were nothing but a blink of an eye in the face of immortality, a mere speck in comparison to the entirety of eternity. What was a day when you had decades more of them to follow with no end in sight?

It was like watching the sakuras outside his office window. There was something sad about watching a petal pull free and drift away, forgotten, in the wind but there were always more to take its place. Time never stopped spinning and the cherry blossoms never stopped blooming.

Sometimes he wished they would.

Time was that unreachable horizon – no matter how far you walk, it never seemed to change. You passed things on your way – people, places, events – but in the end they all fell to vague memories, wisps of things once loved that were now too airy to grasp.

So how could one person make it seem as if all that time was going to dry up before his eyes? How could one person make that remote horizon seem to loom over him or make him want to stray from the path he'd been following all these years?

Tsuzuki would never fully understand the affect his younger partner had on him. He had tried to make sense of it for a while but soon learned that such a feat was impossible. The younger Shinigami had powers over him that stretched far beyond that of empathy and it was no use trying to decipher them.

After all, when Hisoka could make three months actually feel like three months when the same length of time had seemed mere moments previously… he had no reason to complain. Three months also happened to be a very important length of time, probably the most important, Tsuzuki felt, in his entire existence in Meifu. Or more specifically, the past three months.

It would be ninety-one days tomorrow since he had moved into Hisoka's home. It wasn't really an important day. They had no special plans, they had not mentioned it once in conversation and it would probably pass as any other day. But it was still a day Tsuzuki liked to keep in mind and he knew his partner would recognize it for what it was – even if they didn't speak of it.

Tsuzuki had soon come to find that once they moved in together, words weren't needed so much anymore. They still talked, of course, probably even more so now than before – but it wasn't always necessary. So much time together had taught them to read body language as clear as written words and sometimes it was just that much more effective for the moments when words did not express what needed to be said.

There were a lot of moments like that, Tsuzuki realized in retrospect. When he managed to talk Hisoka into watching TV with him, the eternally young male had a tendency to pick at the hem of his shirt when he wanted to sit closer to him but had no excuses to do so. Or when he wanted to snuggle at night (Hisoka refused to refer to it as snuggling), the empath would lay on his back with his hands laced on his chest and pretend to be studying the ceiling. Tsuzuki suspected it was to appear lost in thought but Hisoka subconsciously liked to chew on things when he was thinking that hard.

Usually people pegged himself as the type to chew at his pen or the end of a straw but in actuality that was a trait of his partner's. Generally, before he tried to start a serious conversation, Hisoka would nibble at the end of his chopsticks long after the food had been consumed. When he was really working hard at the office, even if he was using the computer instead of writing by hand, he would dig out a pen and chew at the base or the cap.

Tsuzuki liked watching Hisoka. Hisoka knew Tsuzuki liked to watch him. The purple-eyed man suspected that this was one of the reasons the other had stopped complaining when he took it upon himself to read over his shoulder. He tried not to do it so much at first considering how uncomfortable it seemed to make his housemate but Hisoka eventually warmed to the action and paid little mind to it anymore.

Hisoka probably knew he was not actually reading over his shoulder. Tsuzuki had a horrible time with languages and it seemed that his partner's favorite books all happened to be foreign. So when he snuck up behind the worn blue loveseat Hisoka had an obvious lust for sitting in while he read, he would peer over the tiny-texted pages until they had been turned several times before taking to watching the green eyed boy out the corner of his own.

Occasionally he would point out random words on the page that he recognized to check their meanings. It was an unnecessary attempt to make it seem as though he'd really been trying to follow along. They both knew otherwise but they both played along anyway.

They did a lot of playing, actually. Insults that had once poured so viciously from his partner's mouth were now merely exasperated and sometimes even affectionate. Tsuzuki still whined about work (especially cleaning around the house) but nowadays he mostly did it merely to get a rise out of his partner.

He had been beat with a rather thick American book when Hisoka first figured out, via his empathy, that the brunette _liked_ to make him mad half the time.

"But you're cute when you're angry, Hiso—ow!"

Hisoka had glared. "I am NOT cute!" he'd stated firmly. Well, if stating firmly and shouting were the same thing, that is.

Tsuzuki still thought he was cute. Hisoka had stopped trying to make him think differently.

Every day seemed worthwhile now. Their time had meaning with each other, meaning that neither could find in their living lives or in their first while in Meifu. Even if Tsuzuki's "first while" was quite a bit longer than Hisoka's.

Now, as he watched the clock tick later and later into the night, Tsuzuki smiled. He liked living with Hisoka. He liked putting up with his softening attitude and he liked fighting him for the blankets some nights. He liked using up all the hot water in a bath three days in a row just to get the younger boy to join him on the fourth. He liked making Hisoka try a number of little sweets just to find out the empath would eat a Warhead with enough coaxing. He liked knowing how his partner hated tea and just how he liked his coffee. He liked…

Everything.

Sure there were times when they really fought and when they needed time apart but those times were far and few between. He loved living with Hisoka and decided to make a point of that as he came into the living room and plopped down on the couch with a cup of tea. Hisoka may not like it but he certainly did.

As usual the brown-blonde haired teenager was curled up in that damned chair, leaning half against the back and half against one arm, socked feet on the other arm. With the book he had tucked in his arm as it was, – Tsuzuki noted that it was new. The last book had been green and this one was black – it took several moments to distinguish the title.

Or rather, the strange symbols that made up the title. It was another English book.

"Ne, what are you reading this time, Hisoka?" he asked after a moment, biting back a smile when the other jumped slightly at his voice. It was cute how wrapped up he could get in his books to not even _sense_ him approaching.

Hisoka must have caught that thought because he glared slightly when he looked up. The look didn't linger long, thankfully. "Mm. I just found it in the library. It's about various religions around the world."

Tsuzuki blinked slightly. He'd never taken Hisoka for the religious type.

"I'm not. It just looked interesting," Hisoka replied to the unasked question, turning a page in the book. Tsuzuki gave a slight 'oh' sound.

"….Were you ever religious?" he asked.

It was Hisoka's turn to blink now. "What do you mean?" he asked, frowning a little.

Tsuzuki took a sip of his tea, listening to the clock tick from the kitchen for a moment. "I mean… you know, before you died. Were you religious then?"

The teenager tensed visibly for a moment at the question before his brows knitted further together in a thoughtful manner. Tsuzuki half expected him to dig out a pen from one of the coffee table drawers.

"No," Hisoka replied several silent moments later. "I wasn't. I saw no point in religion. Why waist faith on some being that nobody has any solid proof to support his existence with?"

Tsuzuki tilted his head slightly. "But that's what faith is. Believing in something even if there isn't any logical proof or evidence."

"Well that's stupid."

The brunette smiled at the blunt reply, shrugging slightly. "I don't think so."

Hisoka seemed mildly surprised by that response. "You believed in that sort of thing while you were alive?"

"I did. Especially after Ruka…" Tsuzuki coughed slightly and took a drink. "It was nice to think she was in a better place. I spent a lot of time praying to be taken with her after that.."

Hisoka made a little 'nn' sound in the back of his throat that suggested he didn't know what to say. The way he'd shut his book and sat up a little straighter in his chair, however, expressed the comfort he couldn't figure out how to give properly.

Tsuzuki smiled again and waved a hand. He didn't need to hear anything; he could feel the warmth the ash haired Shinigami was subconsciously projecting to him. "It's alright. I guess it's just a matter of opi – oops!"

"You idiot! Don't just stare at it, pick the glass up!" Hisoka ordered as he jumped up from his seat and hurried to the kitchen for paper towels.

"Sorry! Sorry, Hisoka!" Tsuzuki called, setting his glass back to rights. Only a shallow ring of tea was left in the bottom of the cup, the rest of the amber liquid flowing across and over the edge of the table away from the coaster he'd meant to set his drink on.

Hisoka was grumbling when he came back into the living room, a wad of paper towels in one hand and the rest of the roll in the other, he tossed the roll at Tsuzuki and proceeded to soak up what was still on top of the table, stroking the liquid away from the table edge to avoid anymore spilling onto the carpet Tsuzuki was trying to dab dry.

"That better not stain.." Hisoka muttered, glaring at his wet handful of paper towels.

Tsuzuki ducked to hide a grin as he dried off the side of the table before resuming his pressing at the carpet. "It's coming out alright."

"Lucky you."

"Aw, I have you Hisoka! Of course I'm lucky!" Tsuzuki chirped, yelping when a wad of sticky, damp paper towels hit him in the face.

"Idiot! That's not what I meant!" Hisoka snapped, cheeks pink.

Tsuzuki had to bite back a comment. But he thought it anyway. _Hisoka's so cute when he blushes!_

"Tsuzuki!"

Later that night, as he nursed a bump on the side of his head, Tsuzuki had to smile down at Hisoka. For all his yelling and blushing and hitting, the younger had still let himself be pulled to and fall against Tsuzuki's chest. Deciding that his head was fine, the brunette reached down to pet the slumbering Shinigami's hair lightly, noting with warm affection how the other leaned into his touch.

It was moments like this one that he seemed to forget he was immortal. Hisoka's face was soft and peaceful in sleep, thin squares of moonlight spilling through the blinds above and over the bed. One of the glowing bars fell over the teen's cheek, making his skin seem porcelain and the lock of hair brushing over it golden. He was beautiful.

But not anymore so than during the day.

And that thought made Tsuzuki smile and feel as though he didn't have nearly enough time to spend with the younger male. The hourglass of time that had previously seemed to have too much sand now felt to be draining far to quickly. Even though he knew the bottom would never fully fill, that gripping sensation of losing time was surprisingly pleasant. It made him _need_ to "live" every one of these days to their fullest, to really appreciate the decades before them.

Settling down into a slightly more comfortable position, the brunette watched Hisoka shift unconsciously with him and prayed he felt the same way.

He almost didn't hear the groggy murmur against his chest as he started to drift off and when he first woke the next morning he wasn't sure if he'd imagined it or not. But in the end he realized he had heard the sleepy little voice –

"H'ppy anniv'sary.."

and that was enough to ease all of his doubts.


End file.
